Her innocent manœuvres were met, however, by the sinister intrigues of Sejanus, one of the most unscrupulous characters we have yet encountered. Under a cloak of friendliness he was countering her schemes and ruining her house. He had seduced her daughter Livilla, the wife of Tiberius’s son Drusus, and had, with her connivance, poisoned the young prince, and kept the secret from the Emperor for many years. It is said that he then made proposals to Agrippina to unite their ambitions, and, when these were rejected, he determined to destroy her and secure the supreme power for himself. He put his great ability astutely at the service of the Emperor, and once had the good fortune to save his life, by arching his herculean body over Tiberius when the roof of a cave fell on them. It is probable that he inflamed the resentment of Tiberius against his mother, and then used the estrangement to increase the unpopularity of the Emperor. Scurrilous libels on “the ungrateful son” were current in Rome. These are sometimes attributed to writers in the service of Livia, but it would be a natural part of the scheme of Sejanus to spread them. On one occasion a noble lady, Appuleia Varilia, was charged by the Senate with accusing Tiberius and Livia of incest. Tiberius consulted his mother, and declared to the Senate that they wished to treat the libel with contemptuous indifference. To Sejanus also we must, on the authority of Tacitus, attribute a plot against Agrippina, which other writers assign to Tiberius or to Livia. At a banquet in the palace it was noticed that Agrippina, pale and sullen, passed all the dishes untouched. Tiberius at length invited her to eat a fine apple which he chose. Under the eyes of all she handed it to a servant to throw away, and Tiberius not unnaturally complained of her unjust suspicions. Tacitus, who gives the most credible version of the story, says that the agents of Sejanus had warned her that she was to be poisoned at the banquet, so that she would act in a way that the Emperor would resent. Tiberius, weary of the violent passions of the capital, now lived chiefly in Campania. It is not improbable that his disfigurement made him sensitive. Rome would not spare the feelings of so unpopular a ruler. It is not at all clear that he shrank from his Imperial duties--Suetonius expressly says that he thought it possible to rule better from the provinces--or that he wished to indulge in the wild debauches which some attribute to him. Probably Sejanus, to secure more power for himself, persuaded him that he could best discharge his duties from a provincial seat.